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Episode 15

At that moment, Kim Sohye turned back to her and beckoned.

“Miss Eunjo.”

She had been keeping quite a distance so as not to disturb the two men’s private conversation.

“Yes, Chairwoman.”

When she hurried over, Kim Sohye asked her to turn off the microphone for a moment.

“Turn this off for a bit. I just thought of something urgent I need to discuss with Chairman Kim of the Yewon Society.”

“Ah, yes.”

Eunjo quickly switched off the microphone.

She even kindly added an explanation: if Kim Sohye needed her, she only had to push this small button up.

Following her explanation, Kim Sohye tested the power button and nodded.

“Alright. In the meantime, keep this fellow well occupied in the Inside exhibition hall. I’ll be right back.”

After getting Eunjo’s answer that she would do so, Kim Sohye straightened her back and left.

As Eunjo watched the retreating figure, a chilly voice settled over her.

“Impressive. To win Chairwoman Kim Sohye’s favor.”

The tone was somehow crooked, bristling with thorns. It pricked one corner of her heart with a dull ache.

“She’s picky by nature, the kind who doesn’t open her side to just anyone.”

She knew why Jooheon disliked Na Eunjo. It wasn’t something she couldn’t understand.

Even back then, Jooheon showed a neatness in relationships that was close to fastidious.

To someone like him, Na Eunjo was the wrong grain.

Na Eunjo, who treated the CEO of an investment company with extreme familiarity at a party where etiquette had to be kept.

No matter how drunk she was, she crossed the line enough to make anyone frown. The Jooheon Eunjo knew would never have looked kindly on her.

The second meeting was similar.

No—worse.

She mocked the other without manners, and even added a faint threat. So of course, prickly words could only fly from Jooheon toward Na Eunjo as well.

Sparks flew between them so fiercely that CEO Jung Sohyun, who was there with them, didn’t know what to do.

And yet, those two spent the night together—rather, that fact itself felt ironic.

And then the next day, Na Eunjo demanded money from Jooheon, and because of that, Jooheon turned away even colder and more ruthlessly than before.

So it was a little sad. Because the current Na Eunjo was none other than her.

“Are you doing this on purpose?”

“…Excuse me?”

Eunjo, who had briefly fallen into thought, lifted her head.

Jooheon, black eyes holding a sharp blade, swept over her as if dissecting her.

“I’m asking if you’re circling around Lee Eunjo on purpose.”

“……”

“I don’t know how you know Eunjo, but…….”

Tilting his head crookedly, Jooheon narrowed his eyes. The suspicious gaze felt as if it were honed to a blue edge.

“No, I can’t even trust the claim that you know her.”

The voice, sunk cold, made it feel like her heart was being minced to pieces.

“Approaching the people around Eunjo while changing your tone, expression, even your behavior—it doesn’t look very good to me.”

She looked Jooheon squarely in the eye as he questioned her coldly.

She hadn’t taken any particular action, and yet for some reason, just meeting his eyes made it feel like her throat was being strangled.

As if he had cornered her and was steadily choking her, waiting for her breath to cut off.

Eunjo quickly lowered her gaze and opened her mouth.

“You don’t even believe that I…… know Ms. Lee Eunjo.”

Her voice trembled.

Her throat kept clogging, and the tip of her nose stung.

There was a time when she wished that even if the whole world turned its back on her, Park Jooheon at least would not.

And yet…….

Now Park Jooheon was the one who despised her most.

“There’s no reason I need to know.”

A gaze sunk coldly, a crooked smile, a tone so chilly it was almost cruel. Everything tore at her painfully.

“What would Lee Eunjo lack, to need you?”

“CEO Park Jooheon…… do you befriend people because you ‘need’ them?”

This was why she didn’t want to run into Jooheon. It was unpleasant. That the connection that overlapped with Na Eunjo had to be Jooheon of all people, she hated it. She hated Na Eunjo, too, for being tangled up with Jooheon.

Na Eunjo, who stripped with a big grin even though it was obvious he would never give his heart—she was hateful.

“I, at least, don’t befriend people like that.”

Eunjo deliberately spoke coldly, then looked up at him with eyes gone bone-dry.

“At least I…… want to be with someone who treats me like a person.”

Eunjo dipped her head slightly and asked for understanding.

“I’m canceling as your helper.”

Then she reached toward the microphone clipped to his lapel. She meant to retrieve it.

But she couldn’t. Because Jooheon grabbed her wrist.

Startled, Eunjo tried to pull her hand free, but the tightly held wrist didn’t budge even a little.

“Let go of this.”

When she twisted her wrist, more strength went into Jooheon’s hand.

“You want to be with someone who treats you like a person? When you used to ask to be treated like a toy. You clung on even when I said no. You said you’d become even a toy.”

Pulling her close, Jooheon firmly seized her chin.

With their chests faintly touching, her heart pounded helplessly.

Afraid that if she even breathed, he would catch her roughening breath, Eunjo held her breath.

Pressing her even tighter, he scraped the inside of his throat as if a beast were growling, and snarled low.

“Just tell me what kind of relationship you have. Then I’ll let you go.”

For a moment, Jooheon’s eyes looked like a night sky thick with storm clouds.

It even felt as if the stars and moon had been trapped behind a pitch-black curtain of night, and a heavy, murky darkness had settled over her head.

“What are you to Lee Eunjo.”

With Jooheon spitting her name out as if chewing it, she no longer felt contempt.

Maybe that was why.

“I learned…… painting.”

She couldn’t explain it, but instead a strange pain rose, and her lips opened on their own.

That lie—that she learned painting—slipped out so naturally; maybe it was because she was facing Jooheon.

“What?”

In an instant, strength drained from Jooheon’s hand.

Not missing the chance, she twisted free and rubbed her aching chin as she continued.

“From Ms. Lee Eunjo.”

There is no point of contact between Na Eunjo and Lee Eunjo. So for now, the excuse that she learned painting would be the most plausible. And Jooheon would understand their connection by that reason alone.

“No, from Teacher Lee Eunjo…… I learned painting.”

Because Park Jooheon and Lee Eunjo had been firmly tied together by that alone as well.

Sure enough, one of Jooheon’s eyebrows twitched up. At the same time, a faint light entered eyes that had been nothing but pitch-black darkness.

“Lee Eunjo…… took a disciple?”

It wasn’t a question seeking an answer. It was more like a mutter, like a sigh.

He looked as if he’d been somewhat shocked.

Backing away, Eunjo hurriedly widened the distance between her and Jooheon.

It felt as if a warning light was flashing in her head, telling her she must not speak with Jooheon any longer.

“Then I’ll be going…….”

Just then, Jooheon’s phone rang.

Without taking his eyes off Eunjo, Jooheon took out his phone and answered.

“Yes, this is Park Jooheon.”

The eyes that had been shaken were already sunk into black stillness.

“Yes. Understood.”

His voice was calm, too. And yet the gaze facing her was so sharply honed it made her mouth go bone-dry.

“Let’s go. The person who treats Ms. Na Eunjo like a person is looking for you.”

“…What?”

At his cryptic words, Eunjo frowned.

Then Jooheon let out a cold snort, slid his phone back into his jacket, and said icily,

“Chairwoman Kim Sohye says to bring Ms. Na Eunjo to Exhibition Room 2.”

He spoke politely, but the emotion Jooheon openly showed was unmistakable sneer.

“So let’s go together, Helper.”